Lawyer X on today’s court order

I asked Lawyer X to summarize today’s order by Judge Bridges, and to explain the significance, if any.

As to the order itself, no change. He simply signed the transcript. The GOP asked for an April 4 trial date and the judge dashed their hopes of any rush to trial. He said he could not begin to set a trial date until he resolved whether they could use their proportional reduction method of guessing the impact of errors and votes, or whether they would have to follow existing Washington law and prove how the votes were cast. He also said he would not set a trial until both sides agreed their discovery was done.

Translation: the GOP has not convinced him they can use a shortcut to prove their case (which case they have previously said they couldn’t prove anyway) and they have not convinced him there is any great injustice here that would require haste in resolution.

Spokeswoman Mary Lane is trying to spin today’s order as some sort of huge victory for Dino Rossi, but these days, just getting out of bed in the morning is probably a big victory for Dino. The Democrats had hoped Judge Bridges would clarify the Feb. 4 transcript, but the more I read through it, the more it looks to me like the Dems should be mighty comfortable with today’s status quo ruling.

I’ll comment more on this later, but one particularly interesting point in Lawyer X’s comments is the mention of GOP efforts to use a “proportional reduction method” for estimating the impact of errors and illegal votes. While such a method might dramatically lessen Rossi’s burden of proof, it also seems to be an acknowledgment that they will have to prove something. Still, it seems like an awfully long shot, considering the relatively small number of illegal votes and true irregularities alleged thus far.

In any case, I don’t think Dems are going to lose much sleep over today’s hearing.

The Democrats had hoped Judge Bridges would clarify the Feb. 4 transcript, but the more I read through it, the more it looks to me like the Dems should be mighty comfortable with today’s status quo ruling.

Today’s ruling is a non-event. Both parties would have liked more specific rulings in the matter but didn’t get them. Thus, not much change since the last ruling.

The judge appears to want to think on it more just let the case be flushed out more and refused to set a trial date as the republicans demanded. If he does not set one soon, the likely appeals in the matter may make the November 2005 election not only a legal impossibility but a practical impossibility as well.

Usually a judge does not set specific rules on the requirement of evidence until right before the trial. This judge now appears to be heading that direction too except for cutting off the revote remedy.

The judge likes what he said and is sticking too it. We are in the discovery phase. However, if the republicans keep resisting the democratic’s discovery attempts, the case is going to take even more time to resolve.

What discovery do the Ds need? They had a clean election, and in fact, the best the country had to offer. What do they need to worry about? At least that is what California says.

What are they stonewalling? For that matter, what are the Rs stonewalling during discovery?

One thing for sure, the judge better offer some clarification. The standard of proof for the Ds is about 200% different from the standard for the Rs. And in my opinion, the final will be somewhere in between but closer to the Rs. The Ds standard is one where there would never be an election challenge.

Erik– The Democrats need to prove nothing at trial??? OK The Republicans have to prove everything? Does this mean like proving the true meaning of life too???

Nelson @ 1 The term “revote” is not applicable. However, the Judge can and will set this election aside and throw her derriere out of office…Owens becomes Governor…new election in November. Keep trying to wear out the re-vote term. It’s immaterial.

The key word as you know Goldy is “APPEARS”. APPEARS doesn’t mean PROVES….much to your chagrine.

You know it and the Dem Lawyers know it. The reason the Dems wanted the ruling today was to finally get the obvious out in the public. Not doing so forces Gregoire to continue to fumble with the $2.2 Billion Budget deficit. This is too good to be true.

Today’s ruling was a gigantic victory for the Democrats because it means they won’t be forced to rush through discovery by an early trial date. I know they were concerned about that possibility, so the fact the judge plans to follow a normal trial schedule is a huge relief to their lawyers.

Maybe someone could answer my question. What good ever came from any Democrat? All I see is critisism, regulation, more taxes. They are the missing fucking link that should have died off, but some moderate fed their stupid ass and kept the gene pool intact. What a loser.

You said: “Still, it seems like an awfully long shot, considering the relatively small number of illegal votes and true irregularities alleged thus far.”

I wouldn’t be so sanguine about this. If the judge permitted an apportionment of the illegal votes and the improper provisional votes on a simple geographical basis as suggest by some, then the GOP would only have to show about 650 improper votes in King County (based on the 60%/40% split for Gregoire) to overcome the Gregoire’s 129 vote victory margin. Aren’t the GOP claiming improper votes in King that approach this number? It would then be up to the Dems to find illegal votes in other Rossi voting counties, to counterbalance this.

I don’t think it’s proper to apportion based solely on geography alone, since there many other predictor’s of how someone voted. For example, most felons are male, and I bet that opinion polls would have shown males tended to vote for Rossi.

Moreover, the contest statutes say that a judge can declare another candidate the winner if it “appears” that he got the most legal votes. “Appears” is the same standard as used for illegal votes. I don’t think a judge should award the election to Rossi based on the 60/40 mathematical formula, and similarly he should take it way from Gregoire based on such a formula. There should be a more definite showing.

Finally as a statistical matter the challenger should have to show that it was significantly more likely than chance (50/50) that 650 illegal votes would overcome the 129 vote margin. However, a random sample of 650 votes has a 50/50 chance of being above or below the 129 vote margin. So one should need to show more than the 650 votes. One can do what is called a Monte Carlo sampling to determine the number of illegal votes have to be proved in order to meet a specified probability that the margin exceeded Gregoire’s 129 vote margin. For example, the Judge could say their must be a 75% chance that the illegal votes in King overcame the 129 vote margin. Scientists ususally require a 95% chance to prove a hypothesis.

To prevail under the contest statutes the GOP must show more than there is “doubt about the outcome”. They must show that the illegal and improper votes *changed* the vote count so that Gregoire is not the winner, i.e. erase the 129 vote margin.

Uh no, they just have to show **neglegance or misconduct by election workers** both of which won’t be hard. Everyone here seem to be ommiting the delicate facts that both sides are walking on egg shells and neither side is in for an easy sunday drive of a case.

I don’t think it’s proper to apportion based solely on geography alone, since there many other predictor’s of how someone voted. For example, most felons are male, and I bet that opinion polls would have shown males tended to vote for Rossi.

I think the judge will have a hard time with appotioning the vote as even KC varies alot based on where the voter is. Also, yes felons are men. Some have suggested that precincts should be used.

There are a dozen varients or more. I find it difficult that the state supreme court will support apportioning the vote either.

A logically deduction is that this election was 100% fatally flawed. The election results and Ms. Fraud-o-ire will be thrown out if the Judge rules fairly and impartially. We will just have to wait and see. All the rest is just posturing on both sides. However, the Democrats are sure to boast of any nebulous “wins” their spin masters can think up. Even when the Judge says no to their requests.

Actually, it’s about 730 votes in King County, if proportioned by the final results. So far, they have about 100 suspected felon votes that the prosecutor’s office is investigating, a handful of dead voters, and 96 unaccounted for provisional ballots. If they’re counting on the “discrepancy” they’re shit out of luck.

There’s still time for more discovery, but right now it doesn’t look promising for Rossi.

I assume your next post will fully account for the rest of the provisional ballots in question. Explaining away is not the same as accounting for, by the way. The Democrat legal team will have a hard time accounting for even one of these provisionals during the trial.

Hey… I got news for everybody… you know how they matched voters with all but 7 of those improperly scanned provisional ballots? It was through that precinct-level reconciliation process that you think didn’t occur. That’s right, their reconciliation was so accurate and so well documented, that they could use the records to track down the voters who cast these ballots.

reread 29A 68.070 for the misconduct standard. The misconduct must be such as to procure a different result. Not allow a different result, not through their negligence put a result in doubt–to change by their hands the election for a specific candidate. Procure is an active verb, not a passive one. You cannot procure something by accident.

On probability samples: how is Rossi going to convince the judge that felons and provisional ballot AWOLs are voted in the same pattern as the regular count? What if they have to identify them by precinct? There go most if not all of the remaining provisionals, right? Felons don’t vote like non-felons, and the dead people are way too insignificant to annul an election for.

The Democrats could string out the discovery and expert analysis until 2006 if Rossi tried to use an apportionment standard. Who sets the standard? And then does Lehto’s excellent but ultimately speculative analysis of Snohomish come into play? If you’re going to rely on mathematical probabilities to count votes, why not rely on them to assume disorder in the counting, based on the results?

I think judges hate to rule on shit they have no idea about, and most judges are not statistical analysts. Their decision would be ultimately arbitrary, and they know it. It’s a wormhole of fungible decisionmaking.

On the provisionals–my understanding is they would have the voter log signature as provisional to check against the number of ballots returned to the election workers. If you have 20 provisionals and 22 envelopes and 22 signatures in the book, the assumption King is making is that they got fed into the machine. But in any case, the county then can easily go to the voter logs and match the name from the pollbook. If they’re in there, no worries. Something should definitely be done to control/specially identify provisional ballots, discreetly.

The election contest statute uses the word APPEARS instead of PROVES. This may likely mean a lesser standard of “proof”. Presumably, the election can be invalidated simply based on APPEARS, while the election result can be changed based on PROVES.

Also, the civil standard of PROVES is a preponderance of the evidence — i.e. more likely than not. It simply requires the weight of a feather (or a grain of sand) to tip scales that are otherwise balanced between exactly identical weights.

The Democrats want an impossibly high standard for PROVES — basically beyond any doubt whatsoever. Even in a criminal trial, the standard for PROVES is beyond a reasonable doubt.

I think the GOP proposal of proportional reduction is quite sufficient for PROVES by a preponderance of the evidence. Simply take errors and illegal votes and pro-rate them by the votes of each candidate in the particular precinct.

If the GOP meets this standard of PROVES, the court should invalidate Gregoire’s certificate of election, and issue a certificate of election to Rossi. Even though the GOP is not asking for this remedy, the court must order the relief that is legally appropriate. Rossi can then choose whether to not take the oath of office, take the oath of office and resign in time for a November 2005 special election, or take the oath of office and serve the remainder of the term.

This was just another delay in letting the Republican hopes die as they should. I doubt this judge will thow out the election. If he does from now on basically any loser will be able to challenge the election and draw it out. He will do the correct thing, hear the arguments, listen to each side’s ‘facts’ and reply that ‘It was not the best of elections, nor the worst, leave it as it is’.. IMHO

The statue for contesting elections and the statutes for overturning elections are not the same thing. You appear to be conflating the two.

There is a much lower standard of evidence to file an election contest. To overturn one..there is a burden of proof required of what has been explained to me by a couple of attornies is a fairly high threshold.

I’m personally dubious that the judge will allow some sort of proportional math voo-doo in this matter as evidence. It’s not within any law in Washington that I’ve seen to allow such a thing. Further, there does appear to be some very specific requirements that need to be met..especially in the realm of “illegal votes”…which appears to be what Rossi is hanging his hat on.

Richard Pope– Once again…you are right on brother!! Goldy appears to somehow believe in his heart that he is aware 100% of what evidence will be offered by the R’s at the trial. Madame Goldy—the seer of facts!!! Next we’ll be seeing the Madame Goldy Hotline for a quick reading at $9.95 per minute!!!!

Goldy, I’m afraid your common sense has been tainted by your 15 minutes of fame & celebrity during that ridiculous Eyman/HorsesAss foolishness. I just listened to a recent Brad Paisley song with a line that goes: “When your a celebrity…it’s adios reality. You can act just like a fool and people think your cool just cuz your on TV.” Kinda reminds me of you Goldy….on this issue anyway. You are your fantasy Lawyer X!!!! Adios reality!!!

The deadline for Discovery for both sides is Feb 22nd. How can the R’s be dragging their feet (as the D’s claim) if they haven’t missed the deadline? That wouldn’t be called spin would it? Oh I forgot the D’s don’t spin news they…manufacture it.

The word “Appears” is going to make this case very interesting. I’m all for waiting to see what the judge rules on this one.

You’ve certainly come up with an interesting legal theory. I can just see you arguing to Judge Bridges that the standard of proof is “walking on egg shells” and not “an easy sunday drive of a case.” Which night law school did you attend by mail correspondence? Sorry, Adriel, but it’s going to take more than a showing of “negligence” or “misconduct” by election workers.

It’s true there’s room to interpret what “appears” means, but judges — even Republican judges sitting in Republican counties — aren’t totally stupid. Bridges knows setting a low bar for overturning elections would lead to chaos. Every election would be contested and in doubt for months or years because zealous partisans can always find mistakes and a few illegal votes. Trust me, if the GOPers can’t make some sort of showing that Rossi actually won, they won’t make it past Bridges’ court. The issue is the manner in which they have to show that “we wuz robbed!”

Don- Try reading the law and not just breezing over it looking for the tender morsels you like, I swear I don’t hear too many people here stating the whole truth omittion is king I guess. “If I refuse to look at the facts they don’t exist” -don and his fellow blog readers.

DEFIANCE, Ohio – A man pleaded guilty to charges he filled out phony voter registration cards in the names of Mary Poppins, Dick Tracy, Michael Jordan and George Foreman. Chad Staton, 22, faces up to a year in prison and $2,500 fine on each of 10 counts of false registration at his sentencing April 13. He pleaded guilty on Thursday. Source removed from text

Comments: Well, well,,, the Dimbocrats are being held accountable, how novel! Be sure to read the end of the article where the Liberal witch that enlisted this scum offed herself 2 months ago. The world is a safer place.

“A woman told authorities she paid Staton cocaine to sign up voters for the November election. Rather than getting legitimate voters, Staton filled out the phony forms, authorities said.

The woman, Georgianne Pitts, 41, was found dead in her Toledo home in early December. Officials said she died from an accidental overdose of prescription medication”

The Clinton’s and Dimo’s probably supplied the “medication”, perhaps the same as Vince Foster’s

Should I assume Staton voted for Lurch?

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Reply 4 – Posted by: delta dave, 2/19/2005 12:20:22 PM

I understand Mary Poppins, Dick Tracy, Michael Jordan and George Foreman failed to vote due to the long lines and lengthy waits.

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Reply 5 – Posted by: GoldenSt8r, 2/19/2005 12:25:32 PM

When Defiance Deputies and Toledo Police Department detectives searched the home of the woman who hired Staton, they confiscated drug paraphernalia, along with voter registration forms. When caught, Pitts informed authorities that she had been recruited to register people to vote by Thaddeus J. Jackson II. Jackson is the Assistant National Voter Fund Ohio Director of the NAACP National Voter Fund.

Source = Better monitoring of mass registration

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Reply 6 – Posted by: JrSample, 2/19/2005 12:30:03 PM

This is just a meany wepublican plot to disenfranchise members of the ficticious literary character and false celebrity communities.

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Reply 7 – Posted by: uno, 2/19/2005 12:36:17 PM

I wonder if this means Hillary will have to scrap her plans for a crack fund…

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Reply 8 – Posted by: cpmjohn, 2/19/2005 12:44:06 PM

Thanks #5 for the addition. I say take all money out of voter registration; let’s keep it a voluntary act.

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Reply 9 – Posted by: Rocketguy, 2/19/2005 1:04:03 PM

This is just another Republican plot to disenfranchise Ms. Poppins and her friends!

Your comment was originally blocked by my blog spam filter (I’m not sure on which keyword) and I almost took the opportunity to truncate it before approving. Instead I’ve decided to give you a warning.

In the future, DO NOT include entire news articles or comment threads from other websites in your comments. Use a pertinent excerpt, and then link to it… LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE DOES.

I am extremely tolerant of people here whose opinions I loathe, and/or who just plain often act like assholes. (Ask Cynical… he fits both bills.) But I am not going to tolerate your continued lack of etiquette. If you are going to continue to abuse this forum, I will add YOU to my blog spam filter, and hold all your comments for approval.

Trust me… the last thing I want to do is get into the role of being an active moderator. But I’m not going to allow you to ruin the comment threads for the rest of us.

On 2/14 you described the provisonla situation as “those who signed the poll book but for whom there are no envelopes are assumed to have fed their ballot directly into the machine”. Assumed doesn’t usually cut it on court. What inside knowledge does your Shark X have that confirms that this backtracking assumption will hold up?

Relying on the poll books cuts both ways. Will the Dems really rely on the poll books to “legalize” most of the the illegally cast and counted provisionals, but not allow the Repubs to rely on the poll books to criticize the “discrepancy”?

Disclaimer before you guys flame me: No, Don, I’m not an attorney. And the above is a statement of opinion, no warranty of reliability of opinion is implied.

I plan to post in detail on this later, but in addition to the poll books, sitting over at KC Elections is a big binder filled with the reconciliation worksheets, AccuVote logs, and miscellaneous reports for all 2616 precincts. It was through this detailed record keeping that staff was able to determine the provenance of 341 of the 348 improperly scanned provisional ballots.

If Rossi wants to look for discrepancies, this binder is where he should be looking. Instead, you and he are focusing on voter creditation, a process that has nothing to do with reconciling election results.

Goldy @ 45– When were those reconciliation worksheets prepared, by whom, were there Party witnesses to these reconciliations being prepared, have they been altered in any way etc. etc. Did Logan & staff inform the R’s that they would be looking at these pollbooks?? Just a few of many pertinent questions–

Adriel– Don’t be intimidated by Attorney Don…just because he says he is an attorney doesn’t mean he is or doesn’t mean he is a competent one. Remember, he’s a 30 year STATE GOVERNMENT lawyer for our State which has a $2.2 Billion Budget deficit. Plus Don admitted he tried to make it in the real world for 10 long years and all he got out of it is $1,000/yr. and no return on his capital investment. Don is bitter towards those of us who made it in the real world. So Adriel—Don is a Lefty troll. ‘nuf said.

Goldy– Thank you for sharing your feelings. Loathing someone or calling them an asshole isn’t good for you if you are carrying malice in your heart. I actually look forward to meeting you someday Goldy. I ALMOST went over to the Capital for that hearing on the Homeowners Exemption the other day. I held back because I was afraid I might like you and it would dull my meanness. Perhaps after the trial???

Goldy– And I don’t ever expect you to admit on your blog that you’ve gotten plenty of grins at my posts….but I’m sure you have. This is just like Reality TV!! The cast of characters is amazing. I doubt seriously everyone is who they portray themselves to be…and what does it really matter anyway? Hell Goldy, you even have regular bloggers who are government workers blogging on taxpayer time….calling folks who complain about high taxes “selfish & greedy”. What could possibly be lower, more loathsome and pathetic than that Goldy?? Since they agree with you politically Goldy, would those folks qualify as assholes Goldy???

The precinct & polling place reconciliation took place during the entire fifteen day period prior to certification of the first count. In addition to the initial worksheets prepared by poll workers on election night, 20+ canvass workers worked 10 hours a day, 7 days a week reconciling the worksheets with the actual ballot count. This is the normal, reconciliation process as required under the WAC.

And… I did not say I loathe you. (I don’t even know you.) I said I loathe your opinions. But I stand by the “asshole” comment, as you’ve got to admit, you can be an awfully big asshole sometimes. In fact, you clearly seem to enjoy it.

“I doubt seriously everyone is who they portray themselves to be…and what does it really matter anyway?”

Does this mean you lied when you posted that you’re a self-employed CPA? I suspected as much. All one has to do is check out the frequency and times of your post. You spend an awful lot of time on HA for someone who is supposedly working. What are you really? An inmate doing office work on the warden’s computer at Monroe? Are you one of those felons who voted for Rossi? Come one, Cyn, give us the straight poop about yourself!

Don @ 53– I suppose you are as honest as anyone here…stupid…but honest. I doubt anyone would make up the fact that they were a 30-year career State Government Lawyer after failing to make it in the real world. I doubt you would make up the fact that you only earned $1000/yr. for 10 years and no return on your capital investment while self-employed. This shows you are clearly “stubbornly stupid”….something no one would make up.

In honor of Lincoln’s Birthday…we’ll start referring to you as: HONEST “BUT STUPID” DON THE CAREER GOVERNMENT ATTORNEY!! (ps who is bitter towards those who have made it in the real world when he failed).

I’ll lay off the “parasite” references Don…consider it an olive branch!

Kennedy seeking clear run in ‘06 He’s raising funds to stem challenge…….He’s ready, so gas up the Oldsmobile, have another drink, make sure Mary Jo is looking good, and put the pedal to the metal!! America’s leading Democrat, Teddy [D-Chevis Regal] is ready to go!! [If only WASH state Democrats had such bold, talented leadership!]

Your blog… is the best little horse house in Washington. Dino has got about all the miles he is going to get out of his crying spell; he has about bled the ballot bank dry. Judge Bridges keeps slowly and surely scissoring the GOP’s case; cutting it back to size. Reality is, Rossi best quit while he is behind. (Great site, good blogs.)

55…..”I’ll lay off the “parasite” references Don…consider it an olive branch!”………Not me!! Don “Where’s my guvment check?” and “Heading For Canada” Goldy are the Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton of this website.

“If poll books show the provisionals were cast by legal voters, then they’re not “illegal votes,” are they?”

The poll book shows only a signature that does not coorespond with a cast ballot, leading to the assumption that the signature corresponds with a provisonal ballot that was illegally fed into the machine without verification. I’m waiting for the Gregoire legal team, including you Don, to explain how that assumption makes the provisional a legally cast ballot.

No one contends that provisional ballots fed into machines at polling places were canvassed properly. However, if the provisional voter is an eligible voter, that is still a legal vote. It isn’t nullified by the fact the voter shouldn’t have fed it into the machine.

Untempered Rossi is buttressing up his own edifice. In time, the GOP will have to tend to the decay of what they devised to support. I am a bit tired of seeing the TV shots of Dino with his dog and kid playing in their living room. Please! Kiss the baby! The first and worst of all frauds is to cheat yourself. Rossi wants to cheat himself by handing the majority of felon votes to Christine. Well, you can bet your life that most male felons would not have voted for a woman governor. One, she is a woman. Two, her job is anti crime. After the pork-fat elephants get done singing, I predict that Christine will remain in office and Dino will go down in the Guiness Book as biggest sore loser.

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